Read the land section before listing
Pennsylvania's Seller's Property Disclosure Statement includes a land section covering soils, drainage, boundaries, and sinkholes. It asks whether the seller knows of encroachments, boundary-line disputes, or easements. The Residential Real Estate Transfers Law requires the disclosure statement, subject to its scope and exemptions.
The form asks what the seller knows. It is not itself a survey and does not require the seller to make a professional boundary determination.
Records to assemble
- The deed and legal description.
- Any prior survey, subdivision plan, or recorded plan reference.
- Title documents showing easements or rights-of-way.
- Information about fences, drives, retaining walls, additions, or neighbor discussions.
Older Pennsylvania descriptions can depend on monuments, adjoining tracts, and historical records. A tax map is useful for research but should not be represented to a buyer as a boundary survey.
When to solve the issue before marketing
Consider early survey work when an improvement appears close to a line, shared access is unclear, acreage is a material selling point, the neighbor contests a fence or drive, or the legal description and occupied ground do not appear to agree. Discovering the issue before an offer gives the parties time to define the remedy instead of compressing it into a closing deadline.
What to ask the closing team
Ask whether the buyer intends to order a survey, whether the title insurer needs one to address a survey exception, and what the agreement of sale says about defects and timing. If work is commissioned, confirm the license through the Pennsylvania registration board.